Thanksgiving Aftermath

Thanksgiving Aftermath
After spending the better part of a day cleaning and cooking, we, that would be me, Doug and his mother, sat down for our Thanksgiving Day dinner. It was a very quiet meal as most of our Thanksgiving meals tend to be. We were busy eating and enjoying our bounty and blessings.

It was also a clear and unmistakable signal that I had cooked another great meal.

I read somewhere a long time ago that we Americans tend to gain about ten pounds over the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. As of this morning, I am up only a pound and a half. I ought to be able to drop that and maybe a bit more this week since all of the comfort food that I have been enjoying will be gone.

My family and I are very grateful for what we have received.

The Lenovo Y550 Laptop
My new laptop with the wrong operating system arrived on Wednesday. Once the laptop finally left Taiwan on Tuesday, my time, it made a remarkably good passage to my flat. From Taiwan, it went to Anchorage and then on to Louisville, Kentucky, to Los Angeles, to Gardena, and finally to my flat.

After opening the box and looking at the machine, I decided that I really could not stand to have it in my office.

I took Lenovo up on their offer to return the laptop without any restocking fees. This was an easy process for me, aside from the expected wait times on a call to their support center that is now in India I think. The wait times were shorter than what I had anticipated since I phoned on Friday morning.

I didn’t care all that much for the music while I was on hold. There were more reminders that I was important and that Lenovo valued my business than I would have preferred. I also would like companies to rethink their music on hold strategies. Why don’t you have some classical music instead of more contemporary music? Morgan Stanley has a great music on hold program. It is classical music played primarily on a harpsichord.

I have to congratulate Lenovo for their handling of their manufacturing mess-up. Lenovo got the solution right the first time. Building a machine and installing the wrong operating system then shipping it to the customer is an incredible quality control gaffe and public relations nightmare. Lenovo treated my very fairly and did not quibble over minor points; they paid for the return shipping, something I was prepared to pay for, for example.

Lenovo retained my trust and business. I ordered my fourth Lenovo laptop after I returned from the UPS Store where I dropped off the Y550.

I ordered a T500 laptop which is a business oriented model. I really like the new machine that only cost about USD$60 more than the Y550. The T500 has a track ball pointer and I love that feature. It does have the same wide screen as the Y550.

Doug said it would to watch a Blu-Ray DVD on the Y550. I pointed out that I had a 48 inch wide, high definition television with better speakers in another room so why would I want to watch a Blu-Ray on the laptop.

The new machine is faster but I can’t tell. It has a lesser graphics card; that is fine since I haven’t played a game on a computer since the Legend of Zelda using MSDOS on a monochrome monitor. I did spring for an extra and picked up an Intel Turbo Cache 2GB memory card; this should improve start up times for me.

University of Utah and High School Football
Our old high school, our being my Brother and me, lost in the closing minutes to a team with a much better record. The game was a high school division quarter final game. Our team played well and they have nothing to be ashamed of for the season.

Our Utes lost to Brigham Young in overtime in a game played at Provo. As with any intense rivalry game, there is bad blood and ill feelings. The Utes finished the season with a 9 win and 3 loss record; all of the losses were to Top 25 Football Teams, including two that were ranked in the Top 10 this week. The team also played without a strong quarterback until the last two games of the season.

Utah will be playing in a post season bowl game. Utah finished third in the conference. Texas Christian with a 12 and 0 record will be playing in a BCS game somewhere. The Air Force Academy will play in a post season bowl game because they finished fourth in the conference. The Mountain West Conference has tie-ins with five post season bowl games. This will make things difficult because only four teams from the conference qualified to play in post season games. The two bigger post season bowl games that the Mountain West sends teams to are the MAACO Las Vegas Bowl in Las Vegas and the San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl in San Diego

Visitors
We had an uptick in visitors in the last week. We had 205 visitors who viewed 248 unique pages. There were some visitors of more than passing interest; one was from Afghanistan and the other was from French Polynesia. I am guessing the one from Afghanistan is an American service member since he or she went straight to the January 1, 2007 page that has one of the best and varied collection of photos of young Asian and Westerner women in skimpy bikinis.

I do appreciate all of you who stop by and visit the blog.


Be well and stay happy.

The laptop is moving

The laptop is moving
Yes, the laptop is moving. It left Tao Yuan and has landed in Anchorage, Alaska this afternoon. It is getting closer to my flat. Fortunately for me, I am not planning on going anywhere for the rest of the week. I or some other adult has to sign for the package. Since I live alone, this is my job. With any degree of luck, the laptop ought to arrive on Friday.

University of Utah and high school football
My old high school won its first playoff game last Friday in a convincing manner. This made me and my Brother and my friend Nan from North Carolina very happy. Well, I was very happy.

Our Utes also had a convincing victory, 38 to 7, in Salt Lake City over San Diego State University. The Princess and I are both very happy about how our Utes are doing. They are ranked in all of the four major ranking services. Utah is ranked ahead of the University of Southern California in three of the four services.

My Brother thinks those three ranking services don’t know what they are doing. The Princess and I know better.

I was going to include a copy of the Salt Lake tribune’s coverage of the game. After reading it over, I decided that I could pass. After all, what can you say when you win so convincingly? The game was a complete victory on all counts and all aspects of the game; offense, defense, and special teams.

Visitors
The blog was visited by a small surge of Brits over the weekend. There were about sixty or so Brits who stopped by on Saturday and Sunday. They were all visiting the January 1, 2007 blog entry. This particular blog entry has an excellent selection of photos of young Western and Asian women in skimpy bikinis on it.

That would explain a great deal.


Be well and stay happy.

Where oh where is my new Lenovo laptop?

Where oh where is my new Lenovo laptop?
Just where exactly is my new laptop anyway?

Based on the UPS package tracking service, I think it is in Taiwan now or was when the tracking information was last updated. I have no idea when it will arrive in the States let alone at my flat. I will admit that the package has seen more of China than I have.

I don’t see that as being a great benefit for me. Each time the package is handled increases the possibility of damage and therefore delays in me being able to use it.

Lenovo notified UPS that they could pick up the laptop on November 16th. That was two or three days after I ordered it. That, in and of itself, was hardly remarkable in my mind. I had, after all, ordered a standard model with only one change; I added Bluetooth.

UPS entered the laptop in its package tracking data base on the 19th in Shanghai and then the travel began. It next went to Qing Dao, Qing Dao is in China, then back to Shanghai. From Shanghai, it went back to Qing Dao.

By last night, it had gone to Tao Yuan in Taiwan. Taiwan is closer to the States than Shanghai so we were making progress.

This morning, I checked to see where it was. The laptop was now in Incheon, Korea. After watching the NASCAR race, I discovered that it was now back in Tao Yuan but there was no indication that it ever left Incheon.

My tracking information says that I have “expedited service.” I’m sure glad that I don’t have regular service. If I had regular service, the laptop might get here in time for my birthday in May after a long ocean voyage on clipper ship or possibly a large junk.

About now, I was starting to think that Larry, Moe, and Curly were running the UPS shipping department in China.

I thought things had gotten as low as they possibly could.

I was wrong; things were much worse than I thought. I made the classic mistake of forgetting or ignoring Murphy’s Law. Murphy’s Law postulates that if something can go wrong, it will go wrong.

Lenovo sent me an email that began, “Dear Valued Customer.”

Holy crap, this is bad stuff.

It appears that there was a really tiny, almost insignificant, we don’t know how it happened but we still make great reliable products error in manufacturing. [Cue laugh track now.] It seems that my laptop and a bunch of others were manufactured with Windows Vista instead of the Windows 7 Professional 64 bit operating system that I ordered and paid for.

Fiddley dee, I do declare that is the funniest thing I have heard all month.

Oh, Lenovo has offered to make things right with me and the others who are suffering through their problem. Lenovo is generously sending me a CD with complete instructions, hopefully in English that I can use to reimage the operating system. Reimaging si a fancy word for removing the evil and vile Windows Vista system and installing a clean copy of Windows 7. They are also sending me an empty box so I can ship my laptop to one of their depots so someone at Lenovo can reimage the operating system.

Oh yes, because I am a “valued customer,” Lenovo is going to graciously extend my warranty by all of one full year beyond what I purchased when I ordered the system.

What a pile of crap.

I ordered the laptop in the middle of November. I was planning on having it here by the end of the month.

That ain’t gonna happen now.

The laptop is in Taiwan now or at least I think it is based on UPS tracking data. If I am lucky, I will get sometime next week. Remember, we have Thanksgiving this week so that is one less day to deliver the package.

Once the laptop arrives, I have to repack it and ship it off to a Lenovo depot that is likely to be on the other side of the country in one of those free shipping boxes that hasn’t arrived yet. The free shipping package is supposed to arrive by the 25th.

Notice that I didn’t say which month?

After I ship it off to Lenovo, it will take time to get there. Package volume at UPS will be increasing because of Christmas. By now, I well into December. Assuming Lenovo’s repair time estimate of five business days is anything close to accurate; my returned shipment is going to get dumped into the height of the Christmas shipping crush.

More chance for damage that will require more time to repair.

The Fiasco Fallout
Would anyone be surprised if I said that I had lost all confidence in Lenovo now?

I have.

I was talking with a game design instructor at school on Friday about small form factor desktop PCs. I wanted to pick his brain because I am going to be buying some PCs and a Mac for the computer room and study at my fraternity at the University of Utah after the first of the year.

He asked what type of machine I was thinking about. I said a Lenovo; remember, this is Friday evening now.

My friend said that it didn’t really matter which manufacturer that I bought the PCs from since all of the parts were the same. An Intel Duo Core processor is the same on any machine. The same is true for an ATI Radeon or nVidia graphics card. He took me to the Newegg.com web site to show how much less expensive the PCs could be.

My friend was right. I could get an identical machine, based on the internal components, for less money by ordering from Newegg.com.

Fast forward to late Sunday afternoon, I think I will be ordering three or four small form factor PCs from Newegg.com after the first of the year for the fraternity.

Saving money has such a sweet sound to itself doesn’t it?


Be well and stay happy.

Teaching

Teaching
I went to school last night for a faculty training session. It was about lesson plans. I have heard the presentation before. But, I got credit for my professional development; that is important for accreditation purposes. Since the program presenter loves my current lesson plans, I didn’t learn very much.

We also got fed. Instead of the usual pizza, we had spaghetti with tomato sauce, grilled chicken, I went with the un-spiced version of the grilled chicken, a kind of Caesar salad, and soft bread sticks. There was no dessert. I missed the dessert part.

I shrugged off the lack of dessert because I knew about the post bachelors’ thesis presentation celebration. There had to be something sweet there.

My department chair spoke to me and asked if I was interested in teaching two more classes in the December term. I said sure. Then, I asked what the classes were. He said Project Management. I said he could count me in for those classes. Now, I will have a full teaching load of five classes for a part time instructor.

I will have evening classes on Tuesday through Friday and then a Saturday morning class. The Friday evening and Saturday morning class sequence is the most difficult one for me. I had done this type of schedule before but never on a weekend. I know that I will have to struggle with attendance for these two classes.

I had a chance to look at the two new course syllabi before the training session. They appear to be brand new courses and I don’t think that they have been taught at the school before. On the plus side, there are the same six students for each class so we ought to have a very intimate class; I am thinking that this class should work well in a seminar environment. Learning these students’ names ought to be easy for me.

The bachelors’ thesis presentation went well in my mind. A couple of the students seem to run long on presentations that could have been better with judicious editing. These students have not had any formal training in making a professional presentation and their work showed. Some students had dark blue backgrounds with black type fonts and that was close to impossible to read.

Four of the six students were former students of mine. They did well; I had expected as much.

I had to make an evaluation of the students’ presentations. I thought I graded fairly, based on the criteria on the evaluation sheet. Two students received a score of 65 from me and two received scores of 80 and one received an 85. I also wrote a bunch of comments so the instructor and department chair would understand why I marked the students the way I did.

I think I surprised the department chair with my comments. I don’t think other instructors have been so wordy and detailed. The chair liked that part because he will put all of the evaluations in a file that the accreditation committee will look at sometime in the future.

Then, there was the after presentation celebration.

The food was much better than what we had for the faculty meeting. The cold sandwiches were from Subway and we very good. This was the first time that I have had a Subway sandwich. I usually go to Giuliano’s for my sandwiches.

The best part about the celebration was the chocolate cake with a milk chocolate frosting. That was great. I was also glad that I had my periodic blood tests completed last week.

I was speaking with the department chair. He told me that he was planning on having me teaching a Business Law and Regulation class for his paralegal studies students sometime next year. I love that class and I am so looking forward to teaching it.

I got home a little after 11:00 PM and crawled off to bed quickly. I was tired. I slept very well and didn’t wake up until 6:20 AM when I rolled over and went back to sleep.


Be well and stay happy.

President Clueless or I'm sure glad that I didn't go to Harvard

President Clueless or I’m sure glad that I didn’t go to Harvard
Have any of you been paying any attention to the gaffs that our current president has been making lately? So far, November, in my mind, has been gaff city for him.

First, there was the Veterans’ Day gaff. The photo has been all over the Internet by now and if you haven’t seen it you must have no friends. The photo was taken apparently during the playing of the National Anthem at Arlington National Cemetery on Veterans’ Day, that would be why the generals were saluting and the other civilian in the photo with President Clueless had his hand over his heart.

President Clueless, in a pathetic attempt to start a new trend, had both of his hands clasped together in front of his body. I learned that you place your hand over your heart when our National Anthem is played when I was a student at Stoneman Elementary School.

So much for a Harvard education.

I was watching one of the Korean language channel’s news program last night [Korean Broadcasting System, November 17th evening news broadcast] after I watched the History Channel’s World War II in High Definition episode. Watching the History Channel made me feel very good and proud to be an American.

Anyway and more to the point of our stumbling President Clueless.

The news program spent, I think, three to five minutes on President Clueless and how he embarrassed America; that was the only conclusion I could draw from the segment. They showed him bowing deeply to the Emperor of Japan when he was in Japan last week.

Then, the program compared his greeting to that of President Hu Jintao of the Peoples’ Republic of China and President Lee Myung-bak of the Republic of South Korea greeting the Emperor.

Neither President bowed at all, not even a slight nod.

To make things worse from our point of view since the program was broadcast throughout the Korean peninsula, the news broadcast dug out an old file photo of General Douglas MacArthur who had Emperor Hirohito standing next to him, looking incredibly meek. The contrast to President Clueless was clear and unmistakable; he was being ridiculed by one of our nation’s allies as being either stupid, clueless [my choice], or a buffoon. You can also insert your own adjective of choice here. The United States still has freedom of speech and expression.

I learned, probably in a Naval History class in Navy Reserve Officer Training Corps at my beloved University of Utah, that a United States warship does not lower its flag first to any nation I think the phrase was something like, “the United States lowers its flag to no nation.” That was probably said by someone like Stephen Decatur or Isaac Hull. Our Navy will acknowledge when another nation’s warship lowers its flag first.

I also learned that our diplomats do not bow to foreign rulers. I wonder why President Clueless never learned these concepts; after all he is smart, he went to Harvard.

I know that George W. Bush and John McCain would have never stumbled like President Clueless.

Then, as if to highlight the gaffs, the news broadcast had a sport feature of Yung Kim, a South Korean skater, who just won the women’s skating gold medal at Skate America on Sunday. I think the feature purposefully included a shot where Ms Yung had her hand over her heart as they played the South Korean National Anthem.

An athlete, Ms Yung got it right.

So much for a Harvard education.

President Clueless, no one will think of you as a great or even a world leader if you continue to kowtow and act as Stepin Fetchit.


Full and Fair Disclosure: I am a veteran and I proudly served as an officer in the United States Navy. I volunteered to serve my country. I love my country and everything that it stands for. Some of President Clueless’ closest advisors think people like me are dangerous perhaps because we love our country so much.

The 1,000th Post

The 1,000th Post
I did this because I wanted a simple memorial to my almost five years of blogging. This blog started out in January, 2005, primarily as a curiosity more than anything else. I think I have been modestly successful since the blog has reached over 50,000 readers, not all at once though.

I do appreciate all of you who have supported the blog by stopping by from time to time. Thanks.


Be well and stay happy.

Maybe it;'s not so bad after all

Maybe it’s not so bad after all
I took a look at the football rankings after Utah’s loss in Fort Worth to Texas Christian University on Monday. Things were not as bleak as I thought they might be. Of course, Utah did drop in the standings with the loss. But, we are still in the Top 25 in all four lists.

Here is an interesting thought, assuming that Utah finishes with a 9 and 3 record, it would be eligible for a post season bowl game and could end up playing my Brother’s University of Southern California as their season continues to implode. The last time these two schools met in football was in 2001 at the Las Vegas Bowl; underdog Utah won.


Be well and stay happy

Friday the 13th all over

Friday the 13th all over
It seemed to me that Friday the 13th followed me all over the weekend.

I had a string of bad luck on Friday.

Friday was the regular oncology clinic blood test day. My day started off on the slow side but not that badly for me. Just after I left the flat things turned bad for me. I drive to the hospital using the most direct path possible; it saves both time and gasoline.

I got stuck in traffic between the cars behind mine and the railroad crossing guard rail when the guard rail came down. I had to sit and wait and watch while a slow moving 90 car freight train rolled through the intersection in front of me. I could not get out of the traffic; I was hemmed in.

Things did not improve when I had the blood drawn from me. The technician, who has drawn my blood several times before without any significant pain or discomfort for me, required three tried to find my blood vessel. That was painful.

I had to go see Doug before school on Friday. I left in plenty of time but ran into trouble because the usual way to the freeway was blocked by unplanned road repairs. This resulted is me getting stuck in traffic as everyone else in the area had to deal with the same mess.

Utah Football
The overflow of Friday the 13th hit our beloved Utes when they played TCU on Saturday. They played well but were outclassed by a much better team. TCU is likely to end up with a 12 win and no loss season and stay ranked at Number 4 or better in the BCS system. Utah is now holding on to a 9 and 2 record.

Utah will end up with a good record of either 10 wins and two losses or nine wins and three losses. All of its losses so far have been to teams, Oregon and TCU. which are ranked higher in the BCS.

Utah will play San Diego State University in Salt Lake this weekend. The Utes should prevail over San Diego State but only if the motivated Utah team shows up for that game. They will finish up their season on November 28th with a trip down I-15 to play BYU in Provo. The BYU – Utah game will decide which team will represent the Mountain West Conference as the champion in post season play since TCU, the likely conference champion, will be playing in one of the top BCS games.

The Princess and my Brother will be unhappy because their USC teams also lost this weekend.

On the plus side, my old high school team finished second in its conference and will go into the high school football playoffs starting next Friday.

No. 4 TCU sends a message after rout of No. 16 Utah
Horned Frogs deliver a 55-28 win to state their case for a BCS bid.
Associated Press
Fort Worth
Now that the hometown fans are finally taking notice of No. 4 Texas Christian, maybe the rest of the nation will also realize that the BCS-hopeful Horned Frogs are for real.

Utah certainly can't disagree.

In probably its last significant hurdle to an undefeated regular season, TCU scored three touchdowns in a 2 1/2 -minute span early in the second quarter and beat No. 16 Utah, 55-28, on Saturday night.

"If the nation didn't think that this was enough style points, then I don't know what is," Coach Gary Patterson said. "We're just going to go about our business."

The Horned Frogs (10-0, 6-0 Mountain West) stretched their winning streak to 12 games since a last-minute loss last November at Utah (8-2, 5-1), which had won 22 of 23. TCU also has won 13 in a row at home since losing when the Utes last visited two years ago.

With a record crowd of 50,307 -- a sellout at 79-year-old Amon Carter Stadium without the benefit of an instate opponent -- and representatives from the Orange, Rose and Fiesta bowls watching from the athletic director's suite, the Horned Frogs put on quite a show. Fans stormed the field when it was over.

Matthew Tucker had the first and last touchdowns (runs of 41 and nine yards) for TCU, with five teammates getting into the end zone in between. The 55 points were the most given up by Utah since 1996, a lopsided game that even caught TCU by surprise.

"Not in my wildest dream," defensive end Jerry Hughes said. "I figured it was going to be a dogfight."

Even without guaranteed access to the Bowl Championship Series, the Horned Frogs have changed the question about if they can be a BCS buster. Now it's can they be the first outsider to play for the national title?

TCU is fourth in the BCS standings, the highest a team from a conference without an automatic bid has reached. They trail only Florida, Alabama and Texas -- all winners Saturday.

Ed Wesley ran for 137 yards and a touchdown and Andy Dalton threw for 207 yards and a score. TCU had 549 yards overall, its third straight game with at least 500.

Utah's Eddie Wide, who had posted six straight 100-yard games, was held to 25 yards in 14 carries.

"It was one of our worst performances," Utah linebacker Stevenson Sylvester said.

The Horned Frogs, 10-0 for only the second time since its 1938 undefeated national championship team led by Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Davey O'Brien, play next weekend at wobbly Wyoming. They close the regular season Nov. 28 at home against New Mexico (0-10).

Visitors
We had another average week with the blog. We had 149 visitors who viewed 176 unique pages. We did have some soldiers drop by to check out the young women in skimpy bikinis. The blog is doing its part to support the men and women in our armed forces. The blog is partial to sailors and marines though.

Doug
Doug stopped by on Saturday on his way to see his girl friend. We talked for a while as we watched one of the college football games.

The Utah – TCU game was being broadcast by CBS College Sports, a service that I do not currently have. Doug suggested that I could call in and sign for the service in time to watch the game. I said that I would pass; I didn’t want to pay an extra USD$20 or USD$35 just to watch one football game.

Doug said that I had a point.


Be well and stay happy.

Veterans' Day

Veterans’ Day
Veterans’ Day was originally known as Armistice Day to celebrate the end of Great War or World War I as it became to be known as. Later, politicians did what they always seem to do, compromise. They changed the name to Veterans’ Day in honor of all veterans of our Nation’s wars except for the Civil War which has its own national holiday of Memorial Day.

I am so very proud to have served my country as an officer in the United States Navy during our war in Vietnam. Unlike toady’s veterans, veterans from the Vietnam Era never have received anything that amounts to real recognition and thanks from our Nation.

I don’t know anyone who served then who wanted to go to war. We had our orders and we all swore the same oath to “protect and defend the Constitution” and to follow the “orders of those above us” in the chain of command. We followed orders and did what we were told to do.

Remember if you can read this, thank you teacher.

If you enjoy your freedom, be sure to thank a Veteran because your freedom exists only because Veterans like me and countless others served and defended our Nation. Freedom is not free nor has it ever been free.






May God continue to bless the United States of America.

United States Marine Corps

United States Marine Corps
The Few.

The Proud.

The Marines.

Today, the United States Marine Corps celebrates the 234th anniversary of its founding at Tun Tavern in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Since 1775, the Marines had been proudly providing an opportunity for the enemies of the United States and its people a place to die for their country.

As a United States Navy officer, I was so very proud to have had the opportunity to serve in the United States Marine Corps Reserve for a year and to be able to lead Marines.




Semper Fi Marines.

No car wash today

No car wash today
I had planned to get a car wash today. I changed my mind because there was a forecast of a chance of rain this week. No sense getting the Prelude washed and then having it get dirty from a possible rainstorm.

When I came back to the flat from running errands, I was doubly glad that I had passed on a car wash. The building’s maintenance man was using a leaf blower in the car park to gather up the dust. He was blowing the dust from one side of the car park to the side where I park my car and truck. The freshly clean and still damp Prelude would have been covered with dust.

Sometimes I get lucky.

Fry’s Electronics
I went to Fry’s Electronics in Manhattan Beach this morning to take a look at a laptop computer with a “HD glossy” display. They had the model I was interested in buying apparently in stock. I wanted to see what the display looked like before I pushed out any money.

Unfortunately, the store inventory computer system was dead when is stopped by. I didn’t want to wait until the system came back on line.

When I got home, I called Lenovo's call center. The call center representative said that the glossy display screen worked well in most situations except for direct sunlight.

Fine with me since I don't take my laptop out in the sun to use.

I asked him if he knew of any retail stores in Southern California that carried Lenovo products. He referred me to TigerDirect.com. Obviously, he was either lazy and didn't want to put himself out and look things up or was so misinformed as to be stupid.

Either option works for me.

The new Windows 7 Laptop
I logged into Lenovo.com to place an order for the system that I wanted when I got home.

It was no longer available.

Massively frustrated, I went to their thinkpad.com web site to find something that I could like. I found the almost identical machine readily available for only USD$10 more. It lacked Bluetooth so I popped an extra USD$20 so I could have that feature.

I got a bonus with the nVidia graphics card at no extra cost to me. The new nVidia Geforce G240M card came with 1 GB of memory which was double the memory in the original laptop that I wanted to buy.

I will have to wait an estimated extra four days my new laptop to be built and shipped. I figure that for the extra money I got a big pickup in video resolution and motion quality.

DVRing
I went to the theater on Saturday night so I recorded my Korean historical drama – epic for viewing on Sunday. I was certainly glad that I recorded the program because it was the final episode.

The final episode was a very satisfactory tying up of all of the loose plot points and story lines. I was fascinated at the fact that the primary protagonists all died within a year of each other.

I tuned in on Sunday to see if the channel was going to launch another similar program. The channel broadcast a Korean version of their music awards without any subtitles so it looks like I will have to tune again on this coming Saturday to see if there is any replacement program in the wings.

Visitors
I wandered through the visitor log on Sunday evening because my Korean historical drama was over. I noticed that the Iranians have returned to the blog and they are viewing the young Western and Asian women in skimpy bikinis again.

I do worry about their souls for good Muslim men should not be viewing such material.


Be well and stay happy.

Windows 7 Laptop

Windows 7 laptop
I have been thinking about getting a new Windows 7 laptop because the current Vista model has always had a sketchy operating pattern. I could upgrade but there are limits. The current laptop only has 2 GB of RAM and 160 GB in the hard drive. Granted, I do have an external hard drive but it is only used for backups.

Doug would say, “Dad, get a Mac laptop. It works right out of the box.”

Thanks, I’ll stick with what I am used to having.

I found a Lenovo laptop that will run Windows 7 in the 64 bit mode with 4 GB of RAM and a 500 GB hard drive and some other nice features. I asked one of the instructors – friends at school what he thought of the machine. He is a game designer and thought the chip speed was slow and the graphics card was only middle of the road and that the hard drive was on the slow side. Otherwise, he thought it was a good machine.

My eyes aren’t good enough to notice the slightly slower chip speed and I am not a graphics user or game player. The only graphics I tend to use are in the Excel program to create charts. I can wait on a slightly slower hard drive; I learned how to wait for days and weeks while I was in the United States Navy.

My friend did suggest that I should go check out what is meant by a “HD, WLED, glossy display” was like to view. He had never heard of a glossy display before. Neither had I for that matter.

I need to go the Prelude washed. I can do that on Monday morning and then swing by Fry’s Electronics and see if they have a laptop on sale that has a “glossy display.”

Teaching
My teaching schedule got a bit firmer on Friday. I still have three classes. I did learn that my Friday night class will be followed by a Saturday morning class. That is not the best schedule in the world.

I had a chance to speak with the Criminal Justice department chair on my way home after class. I have a writing class on Saturday morning. I wanted to get his approval if I encouraged his criminal justice students to begin working on their bachelors’ thesis in my writing class. He had no objections and encouraged me to do so. We both know some of our students are not very organized or plan efficiently; they benefit from the extra time to work on their thesis.

The chair invited me to join the faculty panel that will judge this quarter’s bachelors’ thesis. I was honored and said that I would like to do that. It ought to be easy since there are only five or six students. They serve cake and soft drinks after the thesis presentations and I almost never turn down sweets.

University of Utah football
Our Utes won again on Saturday night in a game played at Rice – Eccles Stadium on campus in Salt Lake City. My old high school team won also that means my Brother is doubly happy because his college team won also. The Princess’ other college team was not successful in its game on Saturday.

No. 14 Utes make easy work of New Mexico
Associated Press
SALT LAKE CITY -- Utah freshman Jordan Wynn still hasn't played a whole game. Wynn didn't have to finish his first start, passing for 297 yards and two touchdowns before resting in the fourth quarter as the Utes (No. 14 BCS, No. 17 AP) beat winless New Mexico 45-14 Saturday night.

Wynn completed 18 of 28 passes while leading Utah to 557 yards of offense and the Utes' highest point total in nearly a year.

"He's performing like we need him to," Utah coach Kyle Whittingham said. "He's not playing like a true freshman."

Good thing, too. Next up for Wynn and the Utes is one of the top defense in the country when Utah visits No. 6 TCU.

Wynn was called on a week before in the second half against Wyoming to revive Utah's offense, which had a habit of stalling instead of scoring at the end of drives. That was hardly a problem against the struggling Lobos.

Utah scored all four times it got inside the 20 and broke open the game with three touchdowns in the third quarter.

"That was an explosion in the third quarter," Wynn said. "We talked about it at halftime. We had 17 [points], but that's not good enough for us."

The Utes (8-1, 5-0 Mountain West) won their sixth straight and scored their most points since a 48-24 win over BYU last year to end the regular season.

Eddie Wide set a school record with his sixth straight 100-yard rushing game, gaining 122 yards in the third quarter alone and scoring on a 35-yard run to put Utah up 38-7. He finished with 145 yards on 20 carries with two touchdowns and Sausan Shakerin added 100 yards on 16 carries.

Jereme Brooks finished with six catches for a career-high 135 yards receiving and was one of seven Utah players to catch a pass as Wynn opened up the offense.

"He's a pretty smart guy. He knows the offense well. He knows defenses pretty well, too and knows when to check in and out of things," Brooks said. "Him back there being so smart just makes us a better offense as a whole. He can put any pass where he wants to put it."

New Mexico (0-9, 0-5) lost its 13th straight, the second-longest streak in school history.

After gaining 200 yards in the first half, the Lobos had just 134 yards in the second -- including just 33 yards in the third quarter.

"We have very little margin for error," New Mexico coach Mike Locksley said. "That third quarter, we didn't come out and execute like we did in the first half."

The only setbacks for Utah were five fumbles, four of which the Utes recovered, and Wynn's first career interception. But that was on a fourth-and-2 from the New Mexico 29 and the Lobos would have been better off dropping it instead of catching it at the 14.

Wide, Brooks and Shakerin scored two touchdowns each as the Utes outgained the Lobos 557 yards to 334. The Lobos also hurt themselves with nine penalties for 81 yards.

Donovan Porterie was 15 for 32 for 186 yards and a touchdown and B.R. Holbrook added a touchdown pass against the Utah reserves with 17 seconds left in the game for the Lobos.

New Mexico is in jeopardy of its first winless season since 1987. The Lobos still have No. 25 BYU next week and TCU left on the schedule, leaving them in need of a giant upset against a ranked team or a win over Colorado State on Nov. 21 to get at least one victory this year.

"We have a lot of pride and I know we can play," Locksley said. "Right now the big thing for us is to finish this the right way for our seniors."

New Mexico was still in the game at halftime, down 17-7, until Utah unloaded in the third quarter.

Wynn led the Utes 63 yards on the opening drive, completing a 20-yard screen pass to Shakerin, who bowled over a few Lobos at the goal line for his first career touchdown.

The speedy Brooks made it 31-7 on Utah's next drive, scoring on a 29-yard reverse with eight minutes left in the third. Brooks had to make a right-angle turn to avoid going out of bounds, but kept his feet in and darted down the Utah sideline for his second touchdown of the game. Brooks also caught a 69-yard pass from Wynn to put Utah up 7-0 in the first quarter.

DeVonte Christopher set up Utah's next touchdown with a 10-yard punt return to the 35, where Wide took a handoff on first down and ran right through the Lobos to make it 38-7 with 4:06 still left in the third.

By the fourth quarter, it was time for the reserves for both teams to come in and finish it up.

Theater
I went to the theater last night and saw a comedy, “Magnolias and Moonlight.” The play is based on a Hollywood legend of how the screenplay for GONE WITH THE WIND was written.

The legend claims that David Selznick, the film’s producer, hired Ben Hetch a script doctor to work with the new director Victor Fleming and create a screenplay in one week so shooting could resume. The play shows how the three of the men could have worked together, locked in Selznick’s studio office.

It is a comedy and includes a number of inside jokes. I caught some of the inside jokes from hanging around Doug and his film buddies. I probably could have caught more if I saw the play with Doug.


Be well and stay happy.

L. A. Food Show

L. A. Food Show
Doug had to come up to my flat on Tuesday to go over some paperwork. What originally looked like a long problem was solved in about five minutes. It is certainly very nice to resolve a problem so quickly.

One of the benefits of having Doug stop by was that he showed me how to use the DVR that came with my high definition decoded box from Time Warner cable. I can now go out of Saturday nights and not miss my Korean historical drama, now at Episode 79.

Since Doug was up, I invited him and his girl friend to go to the L. A. Food Show for dinner. Doug said that it should work out but that he needed to check with her. We finally agreed on a time and met there for dinner.

We had a very nice meal with the moderately inattentive service. The level of service seems to have fallen off since I first started coming to the Show. I suspect the staff has been cut back because of slow and lower customer traffic. That would not surprise me at all.

I had a grilled mahi mahi that was flattened to about a quarter inch thickness. It was served with what was supposed to be a brown butter caper sauce.

The manager came by our table to see if we were having a good meal. She specifically asked me about my dish since it is a new one. I told her that it was only an “ok” meal since there were no capers in the sauce as far as I could tell. She said that there were capers in the sauce but I had witnesses, Doug and his girl friend, who said there were no capers.

I was ready to point out that I may not always be right but I am always the customer to the manager if she wanted to make an issue of it.

Perception is, after all, my reality.

The manager came back again just as I was served my desert on a dirty plate. I was tempted to ask her to take the desert off of the bill. Instead, I asked her for a clean plate. Doug and his girl friend almost had finished their strawberry velvet cake by the time my desert retuned on a clean plate.

Doug had some short ribs and his girl friend had a large salad. Their meals were fine.

Overall, I would have to rate the meal as only a C- at best.

I hope they will be better in all areas when I am back in December with the Princess. The Princess is not as forgiving or tolerant as I am.

Thanksgiving Shopping
I was at the local market this morning because I was out of food. A market is a good place to go to find food.

Since I was there, I decided to start my Thanksgiving Diner shopping as well. The store was almost empty of customers and the aisles were all neatly stacked with what I needed. I picked up everything except the turkey and the fresh vegetables that go into the stuffing and rolls. I can get those ingredients in a week or so.

I did phone Doug a couple of times to make certain that I was getting the foods, instant potatos for example, that he likes. Doug can be a picky eater at times.

Visitors and I don’t mean the new television show
We had another typical week for visitors. We had 126 visitors and they viewed 174 unique blog postings. For the month of October, we had a total of 500 visitors to the blog; this was slightly better than September.

The blog did get a referral from Doug’s old blog, skeetonmischa.blogspot.com. This blog has been closed for almost two years now.

I didn’t see any visitors from Iran in this week’s look. Maybe those young men who visited last week were at the mosque instead of looking at photos of young Western and Asian women in skimpy bikinis.

Visitors the new television show
I do think that Morena Baccarin did look particularly attractive as Anna. I am certainly glad that Doug showed me how to record the program. I didn’t see myself as giving up on NCIS to watch V instead.

I like her performance in FIREFLY and then in the film version, SERENITY. I think it will take me some time to get used to her in the very short hair that she has for her role of Anna in the new version of VISITORS or V.


Be well and stay happy.

Colonoscopies are such fun

Colonoscopies are such fun
The big thing in my life this week was a colonoscopy on Friday morning.

These procedures are to be endured with a great deal of stoic patience. The patients have to show up around 6:00 AM and the doctors who will perform the procedures will roll in around 8:00 AM.

So much for a patient centered approach to medicine.

I got lucky was the third one called for the procedure. Maybe lucky is not the best choice of words here. All of my pre-procedure tests were normal; that was comforting for me. The procedure was performed by the head of the Colorectal Surgery Department at Harbor UCLA Medical Center. Harbor UCLA is a teaching hospital. My procedure was a teaching procedure. The colonoscopy was essentially performed two and a half times; once by the head of the department and the other times by his two residents who were practicing and experimenting on me.

They did find one polyp in my lower colon or rectum and they took a sample for a biopsy. The main part of my colon, where the tumor was, was completely clear of polyps as far as they explored with the scope. That was nice to know. I feel confident that the discovered polyp is not going to cause me any trouble. The surgeon set the follow up appointment for early January, two months after the procedure. If he was concerned at all, I am sure he would have had me in the colorectal surgery clinic much sooner.

The CT [computerized tomography] scan I had in July was unable to find any traces of cancer in me. I feel confident that my lower colon-rectum area was thoroughly scanned in this procedure since it was adjacent to where the original tumor was. I hope that I don’t need another CT scan because I so dislike drinking the vile tasting reagent that the hospital uses for a dye or trace element.

Doug came over and spent some time with me towards the end of the week. He drove me to the hospital on Friday since I had a full anesthesia and was not allowed to drive for 24 hours after the procedure. I hadn’t eaten since Wednesday night because of the procedure. We went out for late lunch – early dinner afterwards because we both took naps; mine because of the anesthesia and Doug’s from staying out late the night before and getting up early. I had a one pound hamburger and some fries that were so good. Doug had an eight ounce hamburger and fries.

Teaching
My course for this term is reaching for its conclusion now. There are only three weeks left. Some of the students are in good shape and some are literally floundering. The ones that are floundering have only themselves to blame for their predicament. They do not do the work or come to class.

I spoke with my Friday night class substitute on Saturday morning. She said my class was delightful and she was so appreciative of all of the material I gave her to help her prepare for the class. Most of the time, she usually has a one page set of notes and that is all. I gave her a lesson plan, my summary lecture notes, my actual lecture notes [eight pages], lecture PowerPoint slides, the course syllabus with exercises and material, a special exercise, and I arranged for a half class session in the computer lab so the students could work on their course projects.

I think I may have spoiled her when it comes to substitute teaching.

Halloween
I live in a secure building so we never have had any Halloween visitors in all of the years that I have lived here. I still prepare for them with some candy in the flat. Now, I have a mound of leftover candy that I may take to class on Friday and dispose of it with my students. I went to bed at eight o’clock and slept until six Sunday morning.

Utah Football and other scary sights
Our Utes won on Saturday and improved their record to seven wins and one loss. They also moved up in the BCS standings to No. 14 with the victory and everyone else’s losses. The Utes play New Mexico at home this Saturday and then finish the season with road games against Texas Christian University on the 14th and Brigham Young University on the 21st. TCU and BYU are both ranked teams.

My old high school did not win on Friday night. They lost by a touchdown in the closing minutes of the game. From a quick read of the local newspaper reports, it would appear that they were playing a bit on the sloppy side with fumbles and pass interceptions. Then, the two USCs, South Carolina and Southern California, were both unsuccessful in their games on Saturday.

Utes Survive Scare Against Wyoming, 22-10

Freshman quarterback Jordan Wynn leads Utes back from 10-3 halftime deficit.
Oct. 31, 2009
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -After waiting through the first seven games and wondering if he was going to end up redshirting, Utah freshman Jordan Wynn finally got to make his college debut.

Now he might be headed for his first college start.

Wynn replaced starter Terrance Cain in the second half and the 19th-ranked Utes rallied to beat Wyoming 22-10 on Saturday night.

Wynn threw for 82 yards and a touchdown to help Utah overcame a spotty first half.

"Obviously, this is a little late in the season. But I had told the coaches that whenever they wanted to play me, I was ready to play," said Wynn, who completed his first four passes and finished 9 for 14 with a touchdown pass in the fourth quarter that gave the Utes their first lead.

Eddie Wide tied a school record with his fifth straight 100-yard rushing game and added a late touchdown to seal the win for Utah (7-1, 4-0 Mountain West), which trailed 10-3 at halftime.

The Utes' defense pressured quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels constantly and held the Cowboys (4-4, 2-2) to 74 yards in the final 30 minutes.

That more than made up for getting burned on a trick play that resulted in Carta-Samuels catching a pass in the second quarter for Wyoming's only touchdown.

The Utes sacked Carta-Samuels five times and held the Cowboys to 202 yards in the game.

"We don't exactly like the drama but it makes for a good story," linebacker Stevenson Sylvester said. "A win is a win and any time we can fight back and get a win, we'll take it."

Carta-Samuels was 19 for 30 for 121 yards and caught a touchdown pass on a trick play as the Cowboys surprised the Utes early. But in the second half, he seemed to have nobody to throw to nowhere to go when he tucked the ball and tried to run.

Utah sacked him five times - all in the second half.

"In the first half, I was recognizing what was going on. But in the second, they disguised their plays better and made it tough on me," Carta-Samuels said. "I got tired. Their defense chased me all over the field."

Carta-Samuels is a freshman who replaced starter Robert Benjamin in the third game of the season.

Utah coach Kyle Whittingham has a similar decision to make.

Whittingham said the coaches hope to decide early next week whether to start Wynn or Cain next week against New Mexico, but he has been impressed lately by Wynn.

Whittingham had hoped to get Wynn some experience for a few weeks now, but each game was too close. On Saturday after failed to close on two scoring drives, Whittingham told Wynn he would be starting the third quarter.

"We thought it was the right time," Whittingham said.

Utah also shuffled offensive play calling duties, bringing coordinator Dave Schramm down from the press box and sending receivers coach Aaron Roderick upstairs to make the calls.

Utah outscored Wyoming 90-7 in last two meetings, but the Utes had to come from behind this time after sputtering through the first half.

The Utes failed to score the first two times they drove inside the Wyoming 20, then had to settle for two field goals by Joe Phillips on drives that reached the Wyoming 4 and 15 in the third quarter.

Utah also went three-and-out on a possession that started at the Wyoming 48, then Wynn finally got the Utes in the end zone with a 22-yard pass to Jereme Brooks with 7:35 left in the game to put Utah up 16-10. Utah's defense set up the offense again, forcing the Cowboys to punt from their own 9 and giving the Utes the ball at the Utah 45.

The defense had to come up with two more stops before finally putting away the Cowboys. R.J. Stanford intercepted a pass that was tipped right to him, then Derrick Shelby sacked Carta-Samuels on a fourth-and-6 from the Wyoming 20 with 1:53 left. That led to a 5-yard touchdown run by Wide, who had 24 carries for 135 yards.

Cain was 10 for 13 for 121 yards in the first half, but also took two sacks that knocked the Utes back 12 yards and took them out of scoring range. The Utes had a false start in between the two sacks, so they went scoreless after driving to the Wyoming 17.

Wynn lost out to Cain in a preseason battle for the starting job. Wynn started 4-for-4 and led the Utes to a first-and-goal at the Wyoming 7, but Utah stalled again, then got called for another false start and had to settle for 26-yard field goal by Phillips to get Utah within 10-6.

The Cowboys caught the Utes off guard with about 5 minutes left in the second quarter on a perfectly executed play. Wyoming lined up former starting quarterback Robert Benjamin at receiver for a backward pass from Carta-Samuels, who immediately turned up field and caught the re-pass from Benjamin in stride for a 30-yard touchdown pass that put Wyoming up 10-3.


Be well and stay happy.